Sunday, September 2, 2012

The past couple of months have been pretty quiet here at WLCB. I took
down my made-to-order listings for a good while to work solely on new
items, including the following 8 piece Sherlock Shadowbox collection.

"Are you wearing any pants?"

Keeping white clay clean is a form of self torture. It's near impossible, but sometimes I get really lucky.

"Bored"

When
I was at art school, my favorite part of animating was posing my
characters. I love playing with silhouettes and I especially love this
Watson.

"Severed Head" and "None for me, thanks."

These pieces were added while I was making "Bored". I really love that whole scene.

"Bad Days"

(Digital painting for background)

I
was excited about this piece until I actually had to make it. Sculpting
an interaction like this between two characters was difficult and I
honestly thought I had to change my initial idea. But after several more
tries, this was the result. I love Sherlock's face and his pink little
tongue....

....That's what she said!

"Tube"

I
heart this box. Originally in the show, Sherlock only appears like this
when he comes home from the tube and Watson asks "You went on the tube
like that?". But I really wanted to see Sherlock in the actual tube with
strangers around him. I added a guy in the background, kinda chill but
looking curious. On the other side I added a horrified woman and her
child, with the child pointing at Sherlock while in tears. I also gave
Sherlock a dead pan expression.

On another note, adding
"blood" to a perfectly clean Sherlock nearly gave me conniptions. But
I'm happy with the blood splatters I gave him. Dexter would be so proud.
;)

"Grave"

The messiest box to make. Adding
grass was as anxiety inducing as bloodying up Sherlock in the "Tube".
The background was a quick digital painting I did in photoshop.

"New Year"

Adding
lights to a small diorama box made this piece the longest to make. I
added snow and frost behind the window to give the Christmas lights a
nice glow, and with the added silky white curtains, it gives the lights a
nice effect. I originally planned for the third light to be the fire in
the fireplace, but it would have been so low to the ground that it
wasn't giving the proper light source I wanted for their faces. Instead I
added a large lamp so the entire effect of the lights would play off
their forms.

I certainly hope to make more. Although time consuming and difficult, I love making these. Boxes are my new obsession....O__o

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

New items @ WLCB!! But these intricate pieces can be so complicated to make that I'm not going to bother trying to replicate them again. Thus, these are going to be one-of-a-kind. So if you see one and you find yourself loving it, GET IT! Because I'm not going to make it again. It's just too much trouble and plus, even if I did try, I don't think it's going to look anything like the original piece anyway. Which is probably why I love making them. I get the idea, I make it and it's done and I can move on to another new piece! I hope to have more intricate ooak pieces in the shop AND I've given myself a goal of finishing 1-2 new pieces a day for ready shipping. HZAH!

Wednesday, January 18, 2012

One of the most important aspects to Wonderland Contraband is, of course, the charms. ^__^ This year, I wanted to have a more consistent look, size and shape to my items. Before, there was really no science to how I made my charms. But 2012 is all about finding the consistency. So, all our charms are getting rebooted! And for the better!

Better and cuter!!!

On average, our mini sculptures have grown from about 3cm to 4cm tall from tip to tip (including eyepin on top). Some might say that's not much difference but when you work on a miniscule level, this is a %25 increase in size. I decided to make them bigger because even though they weren't necessarily complaints, there were a couple of comments made last year at how surprisingly small my charms were. So they're now bigger! :P

Castiel (Will be posted next weekend!), Dexter, Damon and Knave of Hearts

Our mini sculptures are also double glazed in diamond gloss for extra protection. Last year, I was using a mix of matte and gloss, but I found people preferred shiny so...shiny it is! And I do like the gloss, I think it gives our charms a cleaner and brighter look.

In the next couple of weeks I hope to add more new characters in what Chris calls our "roster". This week is all about the vampires. And I do love my vampires!! Here's a sneak peak at our new Vampire Diaries charms which will be posted next weekend!

Damon, Elena and Stefan all a little bloody after a menage-trois blood drinking. Oo, kinky!